Last weekend, 6/22, Spray sailed from Salem to Manchester with the whole family aboard. This was our second day-outing on Spray with a destination: the lovely Singing Beach. Manchester Harbor is about an hour’s sail from us, and with the wind blowing SSE we beat upwind past Marblehead Harbor to watch two different fleets racing that day: Club 420s off of Children’s Island, and the Etchells a half-mile further out to sea. After getting as close as we were comfortable to the beautiful Etchells, we turned our back on Marblehead and ran before the wind towards Manchester, around the outside of Baker Island.
I was having some doubts about the choker on Spray. New as the Nonsuch is to me, I wasn’t sure how adjusting it should feel. Easing was never any trouble, but any time I took up hard on it to flatten the sail, I sensed that the single-speed cabintop winch was being pushed harder than the design could have intended. That day, after easing the choker and settling into the placidity of a downwind leg, I noticed a stuttering sound coming from the bow. Seeing and feeling nothing, I held our course and waited attentively for clues. In a puff, Spray rocked and the main filled forcefully. There was a small “pop,” and out of the corner of my eye I saw something confusingly white and small fall from the choker into the water. The stuttering was replaced with creaking.
Now strongly suspecting something amiss, I set the wheel and ventured somewhat timidly up to the bow. Above me, the port and starboard sides of the choker line, entering and exiting the choker block on the wishbone, were tensioned differently: one taut and one slack. Looking closely at the block, the line had jumped the block’s wheel, bent the frame, and lodged between the frame plate and the wheel. Judging by the taut-and-slack sections of the line, it was completely bound up in the block. Luckily the wind was lightening considerably. I watched the rig for any additional issues as we sailed between the aptly named Whaleback Rock and small, inhospitable House Island. Seeing none, I was comforted that even complete failure of the choker would not drop the wishbone onto the deck.
At the entrance to the narrowest part of the channel we dropped sail. I have been practicing an approach described in one of Bott’s Nonsuch articles that involves, clear of boat traffic, setting the helm into a lazy full circle through the wind. Timed properly, one can drop the sail just as the bow moves through the wind, and be back at the helm in time to resume the original course.
Manchester harbor is well-protected, narrow, and full of beautiful sailboats which you can admire up close while motoring to the town docks at the innermost part. We’ve discovered that the docks here are only a half-mile from Singing Beach. In this case I delayed the beach trip by the half-hour that we spent tied up at the boatyard dock. Closed on a Sunday, the yard could only provide a loaned six-foot ladder, a bemused gas attendant to foot it for me, and a couple of encouraging bystanders waiting for the launch.
Stupidly, I focused on trying to free the jammed choker from the damaged block. This turned out to be impossible under any circumstances, but it was especially impossible with one of my arms wrapped around the mast and the other trying to pull the wishbone aft by hand to slack the choker line. My efforts that day were a success only in that I didn’t hurt myself. After the beach, with no wind to speak of in the bay, we motored the hour home.
After thinking it over during the work week (and failing to get our marina’s rigger on the phone), I returned to Spray today to set things right. Unfortunately for OSHA compliance, I was going to have to do all the work at the top of a six-foot ladder again. Fortunately, I came prepared with a new block, a fresh 8’ choker line in 7/16" Sta-Set, and a better plan to remove the fouled block and line.
The block was the biggest improvement. While sized the same (60mm, 1,100kg working weight limit), it has a swivel head instead of fixed, allowing it an additional degree of freedom align with the choker line. In fact, the surveyor who assessed the boat before I purchased it noticed the choker line’s awkward angle of exit from the old block and suggested I keep an eye on it.
I got the length of Sta-Set from the Owner’s Manual – 7’ 9" – and added 3" (I should have added 9" or more) to account for the bowline knot I tied where it attaches to the choker tackle block, instead of an eye as specified.
Once aboard, I quickly made fast the ladder’s top and bottom to the mast. (This was a good bystander suggestion from the yard in Manchester.) Then I took a dockline, and from the top of the ladder ran it through the welded eyes on the wishbone for the two outboard reef blocks, around the mast, and back through the loop in the dockline. By pulling the end of the dockline sternward, I cinched the wishbone towards the mast, slacking the choker. I secured the dockline to the cleat on the starboard side of the mast.
Up the ladder again, the old choker derigged easily, even the shackle pin. Noticing the limited range of motion of the shackle due to the depth of the welded eye in the wishbone, I decided to double up shackles there, giving the block another full degree of freedom. (If my West Marine had Dyneema soft shackles in stock I would have been tempted to use one here.) Anxious not to drop block, shackle, or pin in the water, I tied the new choker to the mast pad-eye, threaded it through the new block, then the cheek block, and tied a stop-knot to keep it there. With most of the gear secured, I carefully lifted the shackle into place at the front of the wishbone, threaded the pin, and secured it.
Tada! Less glamorous was tying a bowline to the choker tackle block with the only-just-enough inches of choker line that tailed through the cheek block. My new line is 8’, longer than the manual indicates as mentioned earlier. The line I replaced, however, was ~10’. Go figure.
The new choker looks very well aligned coming in and out of the new block, and adjustments from the cockpit feel very smooth. To say nothing of the spiffy appearance of new line and tackle.
Photos
The ruined block and line.
The new block, with double shackle.
Installed!
I used this blue dockline to take load off the choker during the installation.
